Blog Archives
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Five Steps to Better Transit Agency Budgeting
By Kevin Connor - Tuesday May 3, 2011Across the board, agencies are being challenged by the Obama Administration to achieve mission goals with less money. In January’s address to the nation, the President proposed freezing annual domestic spending for the next five years, starting this year. As the country focuses on the economy, mobility and the environment, making the case for transit investments is paramount. By linking funding decisions to strategic goals, we can demonstrate the benefits of transit capital investments. Prioritizing projects and gaining buy-in, however, are complex budgetary challenges. They often result in an equally complex cycle of dysfunctional decision-making and poor outcomes. Agencies must improve collaboration and transparency for greater... -
Evolution of All-Electric
By Leah Harnack - Monday May 2, 2011Recently I had the opportunity to attend the Electric Drive Transportation Association (EDTA) conference. It was held at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center in Washington, D.C. The Electric Drive Transportation Association represents battery, hybrid, plug-in hybrid and fuel cell electric drive technologies and infrastructure. EDTA conducts public policy advocacy, education, industry networking and international conferences. Aside from the fun of getting to test drive some of the latest all-electric cars, it was a great opportunity to talk to the people developing this technology. A number of reoccurring themes came through loud and clear. They are looking at fleet conversion as large-scale implementation will help lower costs... -
5 R's for Optimizing Digital Transportation Signage
By Dale Smith - Friday April 15, 2011Digital transportation signage can be a goldmine for marketers, as well as a practical source of information and a useful distraction for commuters and travelers. Whether by plane, train, bus or boat, passengers are standing in ticket lines, waiting to board, or confined to their chosen mode of transport for extended periods. Opportunities for finding the ‘dwell zones’ where people will pause to watch a video display abound. But so do the challenges. Factors such as public safety, vibration, dust, temperature variations, display proximity to passengers, and the risk of vandalism and theft in the public space must be taken into account in choosing both the displays and the mounting hardware. Content must be tailored to longer viewing... -
RF Planning for Ground Transportation
By Jim Baker - Thursday April 14, 2011Some years ago I was involved in building out a large wide area wireless network in the South East of the UK, delivering wireless broadband services to rural areas underserved by wireline technology such as DSL. Before any physical deployment could take place, it was vital to identify where multi-sector base stations had to be placed in order to provide sufficient RF coverage of the target areas, and how these locations could be linked together with point-to-point connections for backhaul. This RF coverage planning stage enables the network operator to understand infrastructure requirements in terms of location and cost, but also to predict throughput and capacity, and mitigate dead zones due to obstructions by landscape topography... -
Know Your Demographic
By Leah Harnack - Friday April 1, 2011At a recent show someone was flipping through last year’s issue of our Top 40 Under 40 and asked when we were going to have a top 50 over 50. Since we first started doing the Top 40 a couple years ago, it’s a joke we hear often. What I didn’t realize is that he wasn’t joking. He said to look around; we’re not going to find too many people under 40 and added that we should know our demographic. This will be the third year we’ve done the Top 40 and for the past two years it was the top viewed article on our website and something that people often bring up when we’re out at conferences and trade shows. When you spend months focused and working on something each year, it’s easy to forget that when other people first see it... -
Going Wireless in Miami
By Jim Baker - Thursday March 31, 2011Arriving in Miami to attend the annual APTA TransITech conference this week, one of the first things I noticed outside my hotel was a local bus wrapped in graphics promoting on-board passenger Wi-Fi. Miami-Dade Transit (MDT) launched the free Wi-Fi service in late 2009 as part of the Wireless Miami-Dade County Initiative, a revitalization plan driven by Major Carlos Alvarez that includes free Wi-Fi in parks and on airport shuttles. To date, free Wi-Fi has been extended to the Metrobus 95 Express service, and four Metrorail commuter cars. According to the city, the Wi-Fi has been well received by transit customers with more than 100,000 unique users since the service was launched. Interestingly, the in-vehicle initiative has been paid... -
Facing Government Cuts
By Leah Harnack - Friday March 18, 2011This past week many industry leaders convened in Washington, D.C. for APTA’s Legislative Conference & Capitol Hill Summit. And from everyone I talked to at the conference and since returning home, it sounds like everyone got a lot of great information and some really good meetings with legislators were had. Meeting with a communications director for a representative on Tuesday, she said she hadn’t seen a line to get into the Rayburn House Office Building in a long time. The line went down the stairs, across the plaza and down the sidewalk. Of course not everyone in line was with transit, but a lot of them were - which was great to see! Monday and Tuesday were a buzz talking about speakers that had been addressing attendees. The... -
Using Analytics to Transform Public Transportation Efficiency
By Brian Stein - Friday March 18, 2011Already operating at a deficit, many public transportation organizations are being tasked with achieving “more with less.” Now, as they strive to improve the quality and efficiency of the services they provide, they must also balance intense budgetary pressures with surging demand for public transport options. To put this in perspective, the American Public Transit Association (APTA) reports 10.2 billion trips were taken in 2008, up from 7.7 billion in 1995 . Against this backdrop, increasing numbers of transit authorities are turning to data analytics to provide them with critical strategic insights into passenger demand trends, scheduling, fare collection and underlying business efficiency. Held Back by Siloed Information Until... -
Positive Train Control On Track for 2015
By Jim Baker - Wednesday March 16, 2011The 2008 Rail Safety Improvement Act requires that new positive train control (PTC) collision avoidance systems be deployed by railroad operators by the end of 2015, on all main lines used to transport passengers or materials that are hazardous through inhalation. Existing safety systems use spaced, track-side equipment to determine train location within a block of track, and a relatively simplistic colored-light notification system for drivers. PTC introduces continuous GPS-based location and speed tracking, with more sophisticated onboard wireless technology for enforcing movement authority from a centralized control center, wherever the vehicle may be. PTC will be inherently more reliable, and offer greater real-time functionality than... -
Obtaining LEED AP + Specialty Credentials
By Deeta Bernstein - Friday March 11, 2011When the LEED AP + Specialty credential was introduced, I was the first “legacy” LEED AP on my block to sign up. I did this in part to be the test case for my team so that I could gain insight and hopefully make their experiences easier. While my newly re-tooled credential sat waiting for further action, the Green Building Certification Institute (GBCI) formalized additional tools and strategies related to credential maintenance; this was one instance where delay was a good thing. When I circled back to start recording my credential maintenance efforts, I found there was a learning curve — getting through the login process, using the reporting/tracking portal and understanding the categories that GBCI uses for prescriptive...
